4 ms·

In an MA program in biblical studies, I realized that the best way to understand what words mean in context is to see how they're used in similar contexts. To d

In an MA program in biblical studies, I realized that the best way to understand what words mean in context is to see how they're used in similar contexts. To do that, you've got to be able to find similar contexts. I didn't like the solutions available from the major software vendors, but it turns out there's a whole bunch of tagged data that's openly licensed. So I built a webapp that has all the search functionality that I need and I put it online (https://parabible.com https://parabible.com). Apart from word of mouth and the occasional post like this, I don't advertise it, but it's getting about 100 users a day. Many of my users come from the majority world and couldn't afford the software from the major vendors, which is very gratifying.

Minor49er 4y ago
I like the layout of this. Do you plan on adding any other versions of the text? BibleHub also shows multiple versions of the text, but has a wide variety of translations to choose from. Though their layout isn't quite this elegant
- jcuenod 4y ago
  Thanks, I have put a non-trivial amount of thought into making the interface friendly. I appreciate the compliment :) I've got a staging environment at dev.parabible.com with other versions (it's a bit rougher and can break, but it supports searching in Greek along with a bunch of other translations). I've also added Apostolic Fathers there (which, I believe, is the first place that Ap. Fathers have been available in English and original language in parallel for free anywhere). I'd love to get versions like the ESV, NIV, NASB... but they're all copyrighted and when I've spoken to publishers about licensing they want me to pay (and I'm a grad student with no income). There are some other free translations I could add (like the KJV, etc.), but I'm aiming at a scholarly audience, who I think don't care about most of the translations that you'll find for free (the KJV is one exception there, tbh).
  - Minor49er 4y ago
    This is really cool. It's quite sad that the other versions are under copyright. The KJV is probably the one that people would look for the most as a baseline, I think. My holy grail (no pun intended) is the pre-Challoner version of the Douay-Rheims Bible. There is a PDF scan of it up on archive.org, and a seller produced books of the text but with their own Old-English-to-English translation, but I haven't found any text-only versions of the original online
  - nickpsecurity 4y ago
    That's a nice, beautifully-rendered project. I winced when you mentioned copyright. On my sites (eg GiveThemLife.com), I try to avoid copywritten material in on-site content. I can't tell people it's free for any use if my dependencies might not be. That God gave us His Word as a free gift, but His children restrict it, just bothers me. I'm so grateful for MPJ and others who made the World English Bible. It's good enough most of the time. If not, I sometimes customize the passage by mixing it with synonyms from other, public-domain translations. Even the dynamic translations, like Weymouth, are good for mining words. Many are on studybible.info, e-SWORD modules, and even on eBay in book form. Far as your tool, I don't see how you could merge copywritten content into the main interface. However, you might add a button or menu action for each verse that generates a pop-up to an external page with many translations. BibleHub is good for that. One side effect is that your site causes people to bump into other content that may help them. Re licensing. I am curious how much they wanted to charge you. Especially for ESV. For one translation, WEB's author was quoted $10,000 plus $10 a copy for use in free software.
    - Minor49er 4y ago
      On the upside, many of the newer translations are corrupted, so the copyright may work to filter those out more easily
waltbosz 4y ago
When I was in college I wrote a Windows app to do the side-by-side translations of the bible just like you have on your site. It was commissioned by a multilingual church. Funny thing is, I'm a atheist raised by Catholics. I'm not sure if I would take the job today. I feel it would be unscrupulous for me to facilitate religious studies.
- jcuenod 4y ago
  I mean, parabible is really aimed at research. In that sense, hopefully there's something useful about it as a tool for study, irrespective of personal convictions. That said, I'm a Christian and I'm studying the Bible because I believe that's how we know God, and I would be the first to say that there is something different about that kind of research.
  - waltbosz 4y ago
    I'm curious: When you say "something different" what do you mean? For example,when you engage in bible reasearch, does it feel that a different part of your self is gaining sustinance?
tasuki 4y ago
Hey I built something vaguely similar! See it in action to compare translations of Enchiridion (https://enchiridion.tasuki.org/ https://enchiridion.tasuki.org/) or Tao Te Ching (https://ttc.tasuki.org/ https://ttc.tasuki.org/). The project is at https://github.com/tasuki/side-by-side https://github.com/tasuki/side-by-side, it is backendless: just drop in some markdown files, and serve it as a static website.

Minor49er 4y ago

I like the layout of this. Do you plan on adding any other versions of the text? BibleHub also shows multiple versions of the text, but has a wide variety of translations to choose from. Though their layout isn't quite this elegant

jcuenod 4y ago
Thanks, I have put a non-trivial amount of thought into making the interface friendly. I appreciate the compliment :) I've got a staging environment at dev.parabible.com with other versions (it's a bit rougher and can break, but it supports searching in Greek along with a bunch of other translations). I've also added Apostolic Fathers there (which, I believe, is the first place that Ap. Fathers have been available in English and original language in parallel for free anywhere). I'd love to get versions like the ESV, NIV, NASB... but they're all copyrighted and when I've spoken to publishers about licensing they want me to pay (and I'm a grad student with no income). There are some other free translations I could add (like the KJV, etc.), but I'm aiming at a scholarly audience, who I think don't care about most of the translations that you'll find for free (the KJV is one exception there, tbh).
- Minor49er 4y ago
  This is really cool. It's quite sad that the other versions are under copyright. The KJV is probably the one that people would look for the most as a baseline, I think. My holy grail (no pun intended) is the pre-Challoner version of the Douay-Rheims Bible. There is a PDF scan of it up on archive.org, and a seller produced books of the text but with their own Old-English-to-English translation, but I haven't found any text-only versions of the original online
- nickpsecurity 4y ago
  That's a nice, beautifully-rendered project. I winced when you mentioned copyright. On my sites (eg GiveThemLife.com), I try to avoid copywritten material in on-site content. I can't tell people it's free for any use if my dependencies might not be. That God gave us His Word as a free gift, but His children restrict it, just bothers me. I'm so grateful for MPJ and others who made the World English Bible. It's good enough most of the time. If not, I sometimes customize the passage by mixing it with synonyms from other, public-domain translations. Even the dynamic translations, like Weymouth, are good for mining words. Many are on studybible.info, e-SWORD modules, and even on eBay in book form. Far as your tool, I don't see how you could merge copywritten content into the main interface. However, you might add a button or menu action for each verse that generates a pop-up to an external page with many translations. BibleHub is good for that. One side effect is that your site causes people to bump into other content that may help them. Re licensing. I am curious how much they wanted to charge you. Especially for ESV. For one translation, WEB's author was quoted $10,000 plus $10 a copy for use in free software.
  - Minor49er 4y ago
    On the upside, many of the newer translations are corrupted, so the copyright may work to filter those out more easily

waltbosz 4y ago

When I was in college I wrote a Windows app to do the side-by-side translations of the bible just like you have on your site. It was commissioned by a multilingual church. Funny thing is, I'm a atheist raised by Catholics. I'm not sure if I would take the job today. I feel it would be unscrupulous for me to facilitate religious studies.

jcuenod 4y ago
I mean, parabible is really aimed at research. In that sense, hopefully there's something useful about it as a tool for study, irrespective of personal convictions. That said, I'm a Christian and I'm studying the Bible because I believe that's how we know God, and I would be the first to say that there is something different about that kind of research.
- waltbosz 4y ago
  I'm curious: When you say "something different" what do you mean? For example,when you engage in bible reasearch, does it feel that a different part of your self is gaining sustinance?

tasuki 4y ago

Hey I built something vaguely similar! See it in action to compare translations of Enchiridion (https://enchiridion.tasuki.org/ https://enchiridion.tasuki.org/) or Tao Te Ching (https://ttc.tasuki.org/ https://ttc.tasuki.org/). The project is at https://github.com/tasuki/side-by-side https://github.com/tasuki/side-by-side, it is backendless: just drop in some markdown files, and serve it as a static website.